Thursday, February 28, 2013

Writing the Libertarian New York Times Sunday Dialogue

Here's the perfect opportunity for aspiring libertarian op-ed writers to follow Murray Rothbard's lead in getting into the opinion section of The New York Times: send in a response to the newspaper's weekly "Invitation to a Dialogue" feature. I've floated the general idea of having libertarians coordinate on responding with letters to the editor before, but this feature is particularly suitable for unconventional contributors due to being specifically aimed at soliciting contrasting responses from across the political spectrum to each week's piece (which makes it even more of a letdown when a promising topic gets a weak response). And while the usual contributions make it clear that New York Times regular columnists have no monopoly on banal authoritarianism, this week's opening letter Invitation to a Dialogue: Skipping 12th Grade is a surprisingly Paul Goodman-esque "practical proposal" "to break the rigidity of four years of high school".